Gather around, kids. We have a guest reader for today’s story time. Mr. Martin usually writes books for grown-ups, but he’s modified a few nursery rhymes for us.

-via The Mary Sue

The highly-anticipated Lord of the Rings LEGO line was unveiled at a party in conjunction with the International Toy Fare 2012 in New York. Or, at least most of the sets. The Hobbit set is still under wraps. But representatives from TheOneRing.net were there and took pictures. The sets themselves, which feature Lord of the Rings minifigures, are expected to be introduced in stores starting in June. See more photographs in their report. Link -via The Daily What Geek

Brian Joseph Davis uses a law enforcement composite sketch program to create pictures of literary characters. This is how the program saw Humbert Humbert from the physical description of him in Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita. I’d love to see a rendering Bel-ka-Trazet from Shardik using this method. Which literary figures would you like to see as a composite sketch?

Link -via Kottke

(YouTube Link)

Are you tired of catching flack from hardcore Harry Potter fans about how you’ve never sat through all eight of the movies?

Do you want to check out all the films without committing more than a minute of your time to the task?

Is watching a recap of Harry going from apprentice wizard to defeater of Voldemort the only way you can start your day?

Well then this snack sized video should satisfy any/all of these requirements as quickly as possible.

–via The Mary Sue

The raven appeared as a minor character in Dickens’ book Barnaby Rudge, which Poe reviewed and criticised for the bird’s small role.

Four years later, in 1845, he penned his immortal and haunting poem The Raven.

It told of a talking raven visiting a distraught man whose lover had just died, arriving ‘as of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door’. The paragraphs then trace the man’s slow descent into madness.

The carefully preserved and stuffed raven is one of the more unusual items in the Philadelphia library’s valuable Dickens collection.

Link -via The Daily What

The Free Library of Philadelphia is celebrating Charles Dickens’ 200th birthday all year long. Link

The Lair of the Clockwork Book, the latest serial from Thrilling Tales of the Downright Unusual by Bradley W. Schenck is subtitled “A Tale of Privacy and Adventure from the Future that Never Was.” The Clockwork Book is a book that constantly adds to its own knowledge.

The Book accumulates stories. It does this by trading the stories it knows for new stories. This sounds harmless: in fact, it sounds beneficial, until you think about it.

Because stories are not neutral. Stories always say something about the person who tells them. They often say more than the teller realizes, and it’s easy to become so wrapped up in the telling that we tell too much.

Everything that the Book learns becomes part of the Book. And the Book grows by trading the stories it knows – to anybody who asks. Anybody. If that doesn’t worry you, you’re probably one of those people that natural selection hasn’t noticed yet.

Over the many years since the Clockwork Book collected its first story people have gradually learned to avoid the Book despite the fact that, in general, people really want to know things. And there must be a reason.

There’s a way to find out for certain, of course: you just have to be willing to ask.

Our story follows those who are brave and curious enough to ask. The beautifully illustrated serial began a year ago, so you can read just about all of it now, and the last few chapters will be posted twice a week until the story is completed in April. Link

Eventually, a printed book may be available. Link

Maria Popova of the always neat Brain Pickings has a great review of The Art of Medicine: Over 2,000 Years of Images and Imagination by medical historian Julie Anderson and science writers Emm Barnes and Emma Shackleton.

The iconic image above is the classic 1926 illustration by Fritz Kahn titled Der Mensch als Industriepalast / Man as Industrial Palace

Wish there were words to describe how you feel while you travel the globe? The Lonely Planet blog coined some brand new travel-related words that may come in handy in your next journey:

automobilogic n.
The state of mind unique to road trips that convinces travelers that gummi bears and fried onion rings count as a daily serving of fruits and vegetables. Studies indicate that this may lead to automobesity.

bratpacker n.
Someone who believes they have a revolutionary system for packing luggage and insists on explaining it to anyone who will listen.

comeuppants n.
When an obnoxious person loses their luggage and has no change of clothes.

crankophone n.
Someone who tries to make themselves understood in a foreign country simply by speaking louder in their own tongue.

filibluster v.
To cause pointless delay by creating a scene in the airport security line to prove some point about personal privacy rights that no one behind you cares about.

Come to think of it, I know a few crankophones! Read more at the Lonely Planet Blog: Link

Newspaper Blackout is Austin Kleon’s latest poetry project. He’s taken pages of text, often from newspapers, and blacked out words so that those left behind form free verse lines.

Link -via My Modern Met

Previously by Austin Kleon
How to Steal Like an Artist
Tea Stain Drawings

In Ovid’s story of Pyramus and Thisbe, two young lovers, forbidden to marry because of family rivalries whisper their forbidden love through cracks in the wall. Their story met its fateful end when the lovers decided to escape their families, and meet under a mulberry tree. Thisbe arrived at the rendezvous first, and narrowly escaped a lion attack, dropping her distinctive veil in the process. When Pyramus arrives and finds the blood soaked veil, he throws himself on his sword; when Thisbe returns to the scene, she does the same.

Does that plot sound familiar? Pyramus and Thisbe are considered to be the inspiration for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. There are several more stories in the post, plus links about places connected with the tragic lovers. Link

Image supplied by Stanley Gould

On September 8, 1908, Mark Twain's home was burglarized. From that point forward, the author had this "Notice To The Next Burglar" posted prominently on his front door.

From the always fascinating Letters of Note:

NOTICE.

To the next Burglar.

There is nothing but plated ware in this house, now and henceforth. You will find it in that brass thing in the dining-room over in the corner by the basket of kittens. If you want the basket, put the kittens in the brass thing. Do not make a noise — it disturbs the family. You will find rubbers in the front hall, by that thing which has the umbrellas in it, chiffonier, I think they call it, or pergola, or something like that.

Please close the door when you go away!

Very truly yours,

S.L. Clemens

(YouTube Link)

It’s impressive enough that ShadowCa7 decided to perform a musical version of J.R.R. Tolkiens “Over The Misty Mountains Cold/The Dwarven Song Of Old Wealth” and committed to doing all 27 verses, but the fact that she does all the harmonies by herself while playing acoustic guitar makes this a beautiful performance to behold.

It takes a bit of a commitment just to sit through the entire video, but it is so good from beginning to end, so throw up your hairy feet, pack a pipe and pour yourself a pint if you’re ready to go there and back again.

–via Topless Robot

(YouTube Link)

This ridiculous mashup, which combines Chunk’s confession to the Fratelli gang in Goonies with a scene from the Game of Thrones TV series featuring Tyrion confessing to some rather nasty deeds, has some great reaction shots from the surrounding characters in the scene, and makes me want to demand a truffle shuffle from that wicked little man!

–via The Mary Sue

This hand crafted sword looks waaaaay too big to be lugging around all day during a convention cosplay session. Inspired by the sword carried by the main character Guts in the anime/manga series Berserk (as seen in the poster above the sword), it’s a super sized prop that looks really hard to handle. I applaud your effort sir, now get to work on that Final Fantasy VII Buster Sword stat!

Link

Comic artist Stephen McCranie has been very busy the past few months, and the result is a new book called Mal and Chad: Food Fight! featuring boy genius Mal and his talking dog Chad. To publicize the book, Stephen is running a special Fill in the Bubble Contest at his website. Your caption could win you a personalized comic portrait and the book! Link

Jim Hines wanted to show off his body make a statement about the sexist depiction of women on the covers of fantasy novels. So his wife took photos of Hines while he awkwardly posed like the cover girls.

Link -via Althouse

Forget paperbacks or even Kindles - the future of reading, as this eBay listing shows, is in toilet paper! From the_heppcat's auction listing:

MOBY DICK TYPED ON TOILET PAPER

My friend and I once joked that toilet paper should have instructions printed on them for certain people.

One day, the conversation grew from there and turned into a wager that i couldn't (or wouldn't) be able to type out a novel on toilet paper.

Yes, we did have some time on our hands but, as you can see from the photos, I won the bet.

There are four full rolls, one roll (epilogue) is about 1/5 of a roll and one half-roll
All of the rolls of TP came out of a brand new -- clean -- package of 2-ply Cottonelle.
They've been handled very gingerly and infrequently.

As you'll see in the following photos, one or two rolls have a tear at the beginning.
This is where i was trying to pull the paper through the typewriter.

I've kept this mod oddity in a box in a cool, dry place for the last 10 years
and have only broken it out to prove to doubters that I actually did it.

Considering what it's been through, it's in amazing condition.

Link - via @brainpicker 

See also: Moby Dick Postertext from the NeatoShop

Judging by the artwork from Mexican Novelas, pulp novels that Latin America eats up like literary junk food, these stories are as terrifying as they are hilarious. Full of masked wrestlers, shadowy demonic forces, Frankenbirds and Yetis, these stories would make a person suffering from paranoid schizophrenia feel sane in comparison.

The only thing you’re missing out on by not being able to read these stories for yourself is the story behind each panel, so head to the i09 link below and read the clever descriptions Cyriaque Lamar has come up for them all, or make some up for yourself and write your own SuperNovela.

Link

Are Women People?

I went into a factory
to earn my daily bread:
Men said: “The home is woman’s sphere.”
“I have no home,” I said.

But when the men all marched to war,
they cried to wife and maid,
“Oh, never mind about the home,
but save the export trade.”

For it’s women this and women that, and home’s the place for you,
But it’s patriotic angels when there’s outside work to do,
There’s outside work to do, my dears, there’s outside work to do,
It’s patriotic angels when there’s outside work to do.

Read the rest of it, and more poetry of the Women’s Suffrage Movement, at The Hairpin. Link -via Metafilter

Jim Henson’s career wasn’t just The Muppets. He and writing partner Jerry Juhl worked on a project on and off over the years. The story Tale of Sand was adapted by Ramón Pérez and is now available in graphic novel form! Read a review of it at mental_floss. Link

Edgar Allan Poe Foundation of Boston and the Boston Art Commission plan to erect a statue honoring Edgar Allan Poe, and they’ve narrowed down the design submissions to three finalists.

The finalists were selected from a pool of 265 artists from 42 states and 13 countries who submitted their qualifications for consideration. Working with the Edgar Allan Poe Foundation of Boston, the Boston Art Commission will oversee the installation of the public artwork in Edgar Allan Poe Square, the city-owned plaza located at the southeast corner of Boylston Street and Charles Street South between Park Square and Boston Common.

The artists are Jennifer Bonner and her teammate architect Christian Stayner, both of Los Angeles; Ann Hirsch of Cambridge and her teammate Boston architect Robert Olson; and Stefanie Rocknak of Oneonta, New York. Their design proposals were first presented by the artists on Monday, Jan. 9, 2012, at the Campus Center of Emerson College (150 Boylston St., four doors east of Poe Square). The proposed concepts will be presented once again at the Boston Public Library in Copley Square by project manager Jean Mineo on Thursday, January 19, 2012, the 203rd birthday of the Boston-born Poe.

The design shown is by sculptor Stefanie Rocknak. See them all and read the artist’s statements at the project site. Or, if you’re in Boston, see them at the library today! Link -Thanks, J.W. Ocker!

Poe House and Museum Curator Jeff Jerome said early Thursday that die-hard fans waited hours past when the tribute bearer normally arrives. But the “Poe Toaster” was a no-show for a third year in a row, leaving another unanswered question in a mystery worthy of the writer’s legacy. Poe fans had said they would hold one last vigil this year before calling an end to the tradition.

“It’s over with,” Jerome said wearily. “It will probably hit me later, but I’m too tired now to feel anything else.”

It is thought that the tributes of an anonymous man wearing black clothes with a white scarf and a wide-brimmed hat, who leaves three roses and a half-empty bottle of cognac at Poe’s original grave on the writer’s birthday, date to at least the 1940s. Late Wednesday, a crowd gathered outside the gates of the burial ground surrounding Westminster Hall to watch for the mysterious visitor, yet only three impersonators appeared, Jerome said.

The author was born in 1809 and died 40 years later. Link -via Fark

(Image credit: AP)

Did you know today is Winnie the Pooh Day in honor of his creator, A.A. Milne’s birthday? If Mr. Milne were still alive today, he’d be turning 130 and he would no doubt be honored to see that his creation is still bringing joy to children to this day. In honor of Milne and his beloved Pooh Bear, here are a few things you might not know about Winnie and the rest of his pals.

Image Via CorneelW [Flickr]

His name has changed over the years, but not much. When the first A.A. Milne books came out, he was originally called Winnie-the-Pooh, but when Disney acquired the rights to animate the characters, they dropped the hyphen and the hyphenless title became much more popular.

The Pooh stories have broken many book records –even in foreign languages.  It has been published in dozens of languages and the 1958 Latin translation even became the first non-English book to be featured on the New York Times Best Seller List and it remains the only Latin book to ever be seen on the list.

Winnie the Pooh may seem like a silly name for a bear, but it was the name of Christopher Robin Milne’s real teddy bear, so it became the name of the bear in the books as well. As it turns out, Christopher Robin named his bear after Winnie, a Canadian black bear that lived at the London Zoo (pictured above in his youth), and a swan named “Pooh” that the family met on vacation. Before the toy was given its famous name, it was originally sold at Harrods with the name “Edward Bear.” As for Pooh the swan, he was actually featured as a character in the same poetry book where Milne first introduced Winnie The Pooh to the world, although he still wasn’t named in one of Milne’s works until a 1925 Christmas story he wrote for The Evening News.

Contrary to many rumors, Winnie’s last name is not Sanders. This story was spread because Pooh’s house says “Sanders” over the door, but it is generally accepted that the name was put above the door by the home’s previous resident and that Pooh just never bothered to take it down.

Most of the other characters were named after Christopher Robin’s toys as well. That is, except for Owl, Rabbit and Gopher. Owl and Rabbit were created by Milne and illustrator Ernest Shepard solely to add a little more variety to the character list. Gopher wasn’t added until 1977, when the Disney company added the character to their animated feature, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.

You can see all of the real plushies that inspired the characters at the New York Public Library. With one exception –Christopher Robin lost his Roo plush in the thirties, so it is sadly missing from the collection.

You can also visit most of the locations from the stories. The Hundred Acre Wood, Roo’s Sandpit, Poohsticks Bridget and the rest are all fictionalized names of real places in the Ashdown Forrest in Sussex, England where Milne bought a country home in 1925. For example, the Hundred Acre Wood is really the Five Hundred Acre Wood and Galleon’s Leap is really Gill’s Lap.

Christopher Robin was less than thrilled about the success of his father’s stories. Apparently his grudge started when kids in school picked on him by citing passages from the stories. As he grew older, he accused his father of achieving success by “climbing on my infant shoulders, that he had filched from me my good name and left me nothing but empty fame.” I don’t know about you guys, but if my dad wrote awesome books about me and my toys, I’d be touched, especially as I got older and realized that if the kids making fun of me used verses from the stories –that they must have been fans of the stories themselves.

While Disney maintained Pooh’s classic red shirt look, first introduced in 1932, critics complain that the company has changed the personality and stories too drastically. Strangely, if you prefer your Pooh Bear to be closer to the original, you’ll have to sacrifice the character’s look as his most accurate animation portrayal has been performed by his Russian version. While Russian Winnei’s stories closely follow those depicted in the original trilogy of Pooh stories, he certainly looks drastically different from the illustrations created by artist Ernest Shepard. That’s him in the cartoon above, if you couldn’t tell.

As for Disney, they’re doing just fine with their own take on the bear and his friends. It turns out the company makes just as much money from Pooh movies and merchandise as they do from the same creations bearing Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto.

Image Via parodyerror [Flickr]

Of course, Disney hasn’t manipulated the stories nearly as much as a few others have. The character has been used by Benjamin Hoff to explain the tenants of Taoism, by Frederick Crews to satirize philosophical approaches used by academics and by John T. Williams to illustrate the works of popular philosophers including Descartes, Pluto and Nietzsche. Apparently the little stuffed bear might just be one of the best philosophers of our time. As if that weren’t enough, Kenny Loggins even wrote a song based on the cuddly character.

He has also left his mark on the real world as well. There are streets in Warsaw and Budapest named after him. And the imaginary sport of Poohsticks, where contestants drop their stick in a stream to see whose will cross the finish line first, is now played worldwide and even has a World Championship match in Oxfordshire.

Are you a Pooh fan? Is there anything I left out here? Also, who is your favorite character in the Hundred Acre Wood? Personally, I love Eeyore, but that’s partially because he reminds me of my lazy, mopey dog.

Sources: Wikipedia #1, #2, Mental Floss

The book by Greg Stones, in video form. -via Everlasting Blort

7. There are three different “grades” of Braille

Every grade represents a different skill level, with 1 being best for those just starting to learn Braille and 3 for the more familiar. Basic letters and punctuation characterize the first, while the second builds off of that to include contractions – making it the most common version found in public. Once a person hits Grade 3 Braille, he or she can learn the shorthand for personal use, such as lists and notes, rather than more formalized literature.

8. “Braille for feet” exists

In order for businesses to meet standards set by the Americans with Disabilities Act, Tilco Vanguard developed a veritable “Braille for feet” that assists the visually impaired in knowing the boundaries of dangerous areas. Technically referred to as “truncated domes,” these bright yellow strips spell out a universal message in order to keep store and restaurant patrons safe.

Read the rest of the list, and you’ll be a lot more “literate” in Braille than you were yesterday! Link

1844, from berserk (n.) "Norse warrior," by 1835, an alternative form of berserker (1822), a word which was introduced by Sir Walter Scott, from O.N. berserkr (n.) "raging warrior of superhuman strength;" probably from *ber- "bear" + serkr "shirt," thus lit. "a warrior clothed in bearskin." Illustration: Adam R. Garcia

Designer Adam R. Garcia started this nifty project called Illustrated Etymology, where he invited artists to illustrate the history of words and their origins in graphical form.

Check it out: Link - via designworklife

Logospilgrim is just a bit interested in the character of Severus Snape from Harry Potter. She has Snape tattoos, dresses like Snape, and has written two books about him. Her home office is a shrine packed with objects and decorations that would please him, including potion bottles that are presumably empty. You can view several more pictures at the link.

Link | Logospilgrim’s Website

Uh oh! Don't tell Harry Potter but He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has been reincarnated! Via Nerd Approved

Previously on Neatorama: 10 Strangest Names EVAR!

To promote an upcoming celebration of Dutch literature, the ad agency Van Wantern Etcetera carved portraits of four Dutch writers into copies of their autobiographical and biographical works. At the link, you can find other book sculptures in the series depicting Vincent van Gogh, Louis van Gaal and Kader Abdolah.

Link -via NotCot | Agency Website

(YouTube Link)

It seems like every movie trailer with any trace of geek interest gets sweded by fans then put on YouTube, so why should the trailer for the upcoming Peter Jackson film The Hobbit be left out?

Although this isn’t a traditional swede, and the filmmakers from MonkeyTheater take some liberties with the lines,  it’s still hilarious and entertaining to watch. My fav scene-when Bilbo is introduced to the dwarves. Haha, classic!

–via The Mary Sue

What do old school tabletop gamers, people who have recently discovered pen and paper roleplaying games, and those who are sick of paying a monthly fee for their MMO and/or want to actually see their fellow players sitting across from them have in common? Wizards of the Coast want you to help them develop the fifth edition of Dungeons and Dragons.

Straight from the dragon’s mouth:

Liz Schuh, head of publishing and licensing for Dungeons & Dragons spoke with the New York Times about their new venture. The game “is a unique entertainment experience because it’s crafted by the players at the table, and every gaming session is different,’ said Schuh. “We want to take that idea of the players crafting that experience to the next level and say: ‘Help us craft the rules. Help us craft how this game is played.’”

I am an avid tabletop gamer, and I’ve been playing games like Dungeons and Dragons since the eighties, so I can see how player input could be invaluable to the process of creating a new edition of their game. But is it really necessary to keep updating the game, when preexisting rules can be adapted? What do you guys think — is this a necessary update, or a Kraken sized advertising campaign?

Link  –via The Mary Sue

(YouTube Link)

Way before Peter Jackson turned the works of Tolkien into an epic series of movies, before Rankin Bass presented us with an awesome animated version of the books, there was another animated version in the works.

And by the looks of this animatic for The Hobbit, which was created by animator Gene Dietch in 1966, it was going to be one tripped out ride. The style reminds me of Mary Blair (Disney’s Small World) or Jay Ward (Rocky & Bullwinkle), but what do you think? Would you have enjoyed watching The Hobbit animated if it were produced in this style?

–via ComicsAlliance

The magic begins after closing time at Type Books in Toronto. This video is brought to you by the same folks who did Organizing the Bookcase last year, with a lot of help from friends. – via I Am Bored

I’ve only read through Fellowship and halfway through Two Towers, so I assume that this scene takes place later in the trilogy. But then why wasn’t it featured in the movies?

Link -via Fashionably Geek

Swedish reporter Andreas Ekström delved into 1961′s previously classified documents on their release this week, to find the jury passed over names including Lawrence Durrell, Robert Frost, Graham Greene, EM Forster and Tolkien to come up with their eventual winner, Yugoslavian writer Ivo Andri?. [...]

The prose of Tolkien – who was nominated by his friend and fellow fantasy author CS Lewis – “has not in any way measured up to storytelling of the highest quality”, wrote jury member Anders Österling. Frost, on the other hand, was dismissed because of his “advanced age” – he was 86 at the time – with the jury deciding the American poet’s years were “a fundamental obstacle, which the committee regretfully found it necessary to state”. Forster was also ruled out for his age – a consideration that no longer bothers the jury, which awarded the prize to the 87-year-old Doris Lessing in 2007 – with Österling calling the author “a shadow of his former self, with long lost spiritual health”.

Durrell, meanwhile, “gives a dubious aftertaste … because of [his] monomaniacal preoccupation with erotic complications”, while Italian novelist Alberto Moravia “suffers from … a general monotony”.

Greene, who never won the Nobel, was 1961′s runner-up, with Danish writer Karen Blixen, author of Out of Africa, coming in third.

Do you agree with the Nobel committee?

Link -via blastr | Photo: Biography Channel

Ever wondered what it would have been like to endure a raven pecking out your liver, or pushing a rock up a hill and never reaching the top, like a punishment fit for a Greek from the age of myth?

Well, here’s your chance to get in on the fun, with these simple, cleverly designed pixel art video games by artist Pippin Barr. Choose from: Sisyphus, Tantalus, Prometheus, Danaids or Zeno, and prepare to be entertained for a few moments by the sheer hilarity of it all.

The games look like they’re straight from the Atari 2600, full of charm, strange shaped figures and jagged edges, and believe you me pushing two buttons over and over again can be quite exhausting!

Link  –via AnimalNY

Most of us experience the medieval epic poem “Beowulf” primarily in written form. But it was originally intended as an auditory experience, declaimed by skilled performers who transported their listeners into a world of heroes and monsters. Benjamin Bagby has made a career of presenting “Beowulf” in this manner, following the medieval traditions, while using a reproduction of an Anglo-Saxon harp. Here’s a clip of him performing the opening lines to the poem.

Bagby’s Website -via American Digest

Previously: Beowulf Socks Are Written in Anglo-Saxon

CONCLUSION: The doctors novels which were studied give an unbalanced and distorted view of medical practice. The medical information was sometimes incorrect, partly due to lack of knowledge by the author, partly due to incorrect translation from English. The reality of medical practice was not represented accurately in either of the series investigated, although the medical information in the ‘Doctors novels’ series appeared to be accurate more often than that in the ‘Dr. Anne’ series.

I wonder if he got a grant for this. Read more at Improbable Research. Link

(YouTube Link)

Recently we brought you the first edition of the Feast of Fiction recipe series-a recipe for Sunshine Souffle from the video game Skyrim. That recipe looks delicious, and easy to make, but their newest recipe for Butterbeer looks utterly repulsive.

That’s right, I said Butterbeer, but before all you Harry Potter fans get too excited, you need to know: this recipe contains neither beer nor butter, and it contains artificial butter flavoring, which makes any food (except movie theater popcorn, for some reason) gross and way too buttery.

Maybe this recipe is a dream come true for HP fanatics, but to me it sounds like a good idea gone terribly wrong. But what do you think: are you going to be trying out this recipe for yourself?

–via GeeksAreSexy

In the alternate reality presented by these slick illustrations by Coran Stone, Calvin and Hobbes grew up to be super spies, and Christopher Robin and Pooh Bear are hell bent on bringing them both down.

These illustrations, and the story behind them, are just begging to be made into an animated series of some sort, and you can read the whole thing at the Geeks Are Sexy link below.

It’s the ultimate battle of imaginary friends, and I like the fact that, in the Pooh picture, Hobbes is still a stuffed animal!

Link –via GeeksAreSexy

Taking a cue from such classics as Alice In Wonderland and Jack and the Beanstalk, photographer Jean-Francois Fortou places normal sized people in giant or tiny sets to create a sense of wonder and dimensional irregularity.

The photos are simple and digitally untouched, and their simplicity is the key to making the whole concept work, I mean, how easy would it be to use Photoshop to simply shrink the subjects?

But that wouldn’t look as cool as setting a normal sized man inside a tiny dollhouse then snapping away as he curls up in a ball, covered in tiny furniture, now would it?

–image via Jean-Francois Fortou –via Flavorwire

(YouTube Link)

This endearing little children’s book will bring out the Wookiee in your family tree, and comes complete with sound unit so you can hear the proper pronunciation of words in Wookinese Wookian Wookiee language.

Guaranteed to be hours of fun for you and/or your kid, unless the gutteral sounds of Wookiees gets on your nerves, in which case you will probably want to burn this book! Check out the advert videos and see for yourself if you can handle the process of learning to speak like a true Wookiee.

–via SuperPunch

Here’s another snowman crime scene sure to make Calvin and Hobbes very happy. They’re impaled on the Ellifrett Structure at the University of Wyoming, and I can’t think of a more festive way to greet the students during the holidays, aside from staging a Santa Claus crash scene on the football field!

Link

That’s why we here at Neatorama wanted to share a little bit of history and trivia about the world-famous character. Even if you are already a fan of Tintin though, read on because there might just be a few tidbits you didn’t know about.

The History of A Hero

Image Via Dylan Parker [Flickr]

Tintin was created by Belgian artist Georges Rémi, who wrote under the pen name Herge. He was largely based on one of the author’s earlier characters, a chubby boy scout named Totor. While he was thinner and better dressed than Totor, Tintin maintained the earlier character’s high ideals and kindness, as well as his knack for getting into sticky situations.

The first Tintin strip was printed in the Belgian right wing newspaper, Le XXe Siècle (The 20th Century), on January 10, 1929. Going along with the paper’s right wing beliefs, the character’s first adventure, titled Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, featured him fighting against socialist leaders in the Soviet Union. After the comic proved to be a success, Herge went on to send Tintin on adventures throughout the world, both in real and imaginary locales.

While Herge started out with a right wing mindset, his opinion quickly changed as Hitler’s legions began to ramp up their occupation of other European countries. By 1939, Tintin began to fight off authority figures from the far right, even battling Musstler, the leader of the imaginary fascist state Borduria, in King Ottokar’s Sceptre. If you couldn’t tell by the name and the time period, Musstler was Herge’s take on a combination of Hitler and Mussolini.

Later that very year, Belgium was invaded by the Nazis, who quickly closed down the majority of the newspapers in the country. They did leave open the leading paper, Le Soir, under the condition that it be put under German management. After Le XXe Siècle, was closed, Herge was briefly unemployed, but soon was hired to work as an illustrator for Le Soir. Soon enough he started printing new Tintin stories in the paper’s children section, but under the repressive political atmosphere, he was forced to strip the comic of its political affiliations. In an effort to get around these limitations, Herge changed Tintin’s occupation from that of a reporter to an explorer, which allowed him a much more politically-neutral world in which to operate.

By 1949, Herge’s character was so popular that he was offered the opportunity to publish his own magazine exclusively dedicated to Tintin. He immediately left Le Soir and go to working on Le journal de Tintin. The character became a massive success and was adored in countries throughout the world, eventually having his adventures translated into more than 50 languages.

As for Herge, he continued working on new stories for the character all the way up until his death in 1983.

The Enigmatic Tintin

Image Via CoffeeGeek [Flickr]

At first glance, Tintin seems like a pretty straightforward guy. In fact, fans of the series often praise how uncomplicated the character is, as it makes him entirely relatable even when confronted by an array of bizarre and eccentric characters in fantastical cities. But when you look a little deeper, you soon realize that Tintin’s lack of complexities make him quite enigmatic.

For example, how old is Tintin? No one really knows. He’s old enough to not be concerned with school or family, to go to a pub and drink, to hold down a job and to live alone, but everyone still calls him a young boy. In 1979, Herges said that when he first started the comic, he thought of Tintin as being about 14 or 15, but by that point, he considered the character to be 17.

But shouldn’t even a 17 year old have some kind of family connections? Tintin’s family is never mentioned in the series, but he is also never called an orphan. In fact, it seems that he seems to have no actual back story before the series starts. Whereas other characters reveal tales from their past, Tintin never does, nor does he ever run into someone that he knew before the storyline started.

It seems particularly strange that he never mentions his family given the fact that they must have given him quite an impressive education. After all, Tintin knows multiple languages, can drive cars, ride horses, fly airplanes, climb massive mountains, do yoga and more. These aren’t just skills you pick up while sitting back in Belgium or even after a few reporting assignments.

Additionally, Tintin must earn money to be able to live on his own without family assistance, but while Tintin is supposed to be a reporter in the early parts of the series, he never is seen actually writing or turning in a story. He never goes into the office, nor does he ever meet any coworkers or even get in touch with his employer.

Even his name is a mystery. Is it a first name or a last name? No one knows. Maybe it’s a nickname or maybe he’s like Madonna and that’s his only name. Some speculate that it’s a pseudonym he uses for his journalism career, but that it doesn’t do a reporter much good to go by a pseudonym if that’s the only name he goes by.

With Friends Like These…

Image Via sinanyuzakli [Flickr]

Of course, with all the vagueness in Tintin’s life, his friends are complex and help provide the character development and back story that the main character is lacking. While there are tons of recurring characters in the stories, two of the most popular are the two that also happen to be featured in the upcoming film (no surprise there). Those two characters are, of course, Snowy (known as Milou in the original and French versions) and Captain Haddock.

Snowy is Tintin’s longest-lasting friend, the only character who stays with him throughout the series. Originally Snowy is there to provide a cynical contrast to Tintin’s constant positivity, his thoughts portrayed in speech bubbles that cannot be understood by the humans around him, but once Captain Haddock steps in, Snowy is relieved of this duty and he becomes much more light-hearted. Unfortunately, while the pup is incredibly loyal, he also has some serious weaknesses. Like all dogs, he can easily be distracted by a bone, but more problematic are his clumsiness and his affinity for Scotch. Additionally, he is terrified of spiders, which makes him less than heroic in certain situations.

As for Captain Haddock, he is also a bit clumsy and quite enamored with Scotch. While he starts out as an alcoholic, he eventually becomes a rather respectable and heroic character. Haddock is quite sarcastic, providing a good balance to Tintin’s optimism. Up until the last story, his first name remains unknown, but at long last, it is revealed to be Archibald.

The Many Roadblocks of the Movie

Image Via Georges Biard [Wikipedia]

You know the movie was successfully created, but at many points, the thing almost fell through. In fact, Spielberg was planning to work on the movie from all the way back in 1983. The director was a huge fan of Tintin after discovering the series after someone compared Raiders of the Lost Ark to a Tintin story. At the same time, Herge was quite a fan of Spielberg and the two were quite excited to work together, Herge even noting that he thought Spielberg was “the only person who could ever do Tintin justice.” Unfortunately, the same week the two planned to meet in 1983, the illustrator passed away. Herge’s widow still agreed to give the rights to the movie to Spielberg because she knew how much her husband was looking forward to working with him.

Spielberg hired one of the screenwriters from E.T. to write a film version of Tintin, but he was disappointed with what she came up with. Unfortunately, he was too busy to work on it any more at the time, since he was starting production on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Eventually, the rights returned to the Herge Foundation and Roman Polanski started trying to work with the group to secure the rights to the film. The foundation felt he would be unable to provide the creative integrity Spielberg promised though, so they declined to issue him the rights. Eventually, in 2001, Spielberg got back in touch with the foundation.

When the rights were secured, Spielberg had intended to make a live-action adaptation of the film, but he wanted Peter Jackson’s company, Weta Digital to create a computer-generated Snowy. If you love or hate the motion capture that was used in the film, you should know that you have Jackson to thank, as he was the one who suggested live actors would not do justice to the style of the comic books.

Unfortunately, only a month before the duo was slated to start principal photography for the film, Universal backed down on financing the film, citing the low box office tallies of other motion capture movies like Beowulf. After some frantic searching, the team finally secured a contract with Sony, who has agreed to make two Tintin films with Jackson and Spielberg.

Yes, that’s right, there will almost certainly be a sequel to the first film, although no one is sure which Tintin stories the next one will be based on. The second film is expected to be released in late 2014 or mid-2015.

Image Via Gregory Bellemont [Flickr]

In fact, if all goes well, Jackson and Spielberg actually want to make another sequel after that, but we’ll just have to see how well the film does before we get too excited. If the box office grosses from the countries it has already been released in are any indication, we will very likely get to see a third film.

The movie was already released throughout most of the rest of the world and as of December 11, it already made $233 million. In fact, it’s already the highest grossing animated film ever released in India.

What do you guys think? Are you excited for the new film or could you care less? Also, were you already a Tintin fan or is the movie your first real exposure to the adventurer?

Sources: Wikipedia #1, #2, #3

In that case, I’ll just take the Tube. Let us thank Google’s programmers for offering this prudent warning.

The map is of northern London, but you can overlay a map in your own city by choosing “The Shire” as your starting point and “Mordor” as the destination when searching for directions.

Link -via Geekosystem

It appears J.K. Rowling was more than a little inspired by Tolkien’s classic  fantasy series the Lord Of The Rings when writing her Harry Potter series, and this cute chart aims to prove it by illustrating the similarities between the characters and plot points in both series.

Check out all 4 sections of the chart at the link below, and see for yourself how Harry Potter literally owes his life to J.R.R. Tolkien.

Link

Super Heroes

They may not be the most artistic gingerbread creations, but these super hero designs by Sugar Swings are certainly adorable and they look absolutely delicious as well.

Russian Literary Greats

For those who like their gingerbread men to be a little less chipper and lot more serious, these figureheads of Russian culture by Craftster forum user Woolylogic are a good choice. Choose between Turgenev, Dostoyevsky (above), Tolstoy and Gogol.

Architectural Masterpieces

Sure anyone can make a one-room gingerbread shack, but turning a unique architectural design into a gingerbread creation takes a heck of a lot more skill. That’s why these great designs by real architecture firms went for so much money when they were auctioned off for charity. In fact, the one above, by Nick Milkovich Architects, Inc., sold for $610.

The Weasley Family Burrow

While this architectural marvel may not look familiar to everyone, Harry Potter fans will instantly recognize it as The Burrow, the adorably charming home of the Weasley clan. Creator mezcraft from the Craftster forums even added the special monogrammed sweaters Mrs. Weasley makes for each of her children at Christmas.

Hogwarts

Of course, the most iconic Harry Potter building is Hogwarts and Britta’s incredibly detailed gingerbread version is an impressive tribute to the majesty of the world-famous wizarding school. Best of all, she’s even got pictures of the entire arduous process so you could attempt to make your own at home…with a whole lot of time and dedication.

Up House

While the home in Pixar’s Up may not be as elaborate as Hogwarts, it is still certainly memorable enough to deserve its own gingerbread tribute, and this one, by Craftster forum user LawrenceKSRealEstate, is perfect, complete with its own set of giant balloons.

AT-AT

Have you ever wondered what would happen if an AT-At took a little off time to go walking through a winter wonderland? Rachel Klemek from the Black Market Bakery did and here’s the delightfully fun and disastrous results as photographed by Instagram user mommy_pants.

AT-AT

This is the only gingerbread creation with two incarnations here, but just look at this adorable design by Flickr user Chez 282 and you’ll realize why they both deserve to be on this list. While this one might not have the elaborate setting to go with it, it does feature far more decoration on the AT-AT itself.

Millennium Falcon

While this time lapse video by YouTube user FresoSweden doesn’t show you enough t instruct you to make your own fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy, it does show you just how much effort went in to making this gingerbread masterpiece.

Ewok Village

Yes, one last Star Wars gingerbread creation (there are a lot to choose from). Here’s an Ewok village complete with a Death Star sitting on the sky above. The Infinate Yums has detailed photos showing the entire time-consuming process.

Starship Enterprise

Don’t worry Star Trek fans, while we may not have as many gingerbread creations from this side of the sci fi spectrum, you can at least enjoy this great Starship Enterprise by Reddit user nem8.

Tardis

Of course, we also have a gingerbread creation from the favorite sci fi series on the other side of the pond. This gingerbread Tardis by LiveJournal user theruu is not only bigger on the inside, but it also comes with detailed instructions to make your own, including a recipe for the gingerbread and frosting.

Serenity

For those that prefer their sci-fi to be a little less mainstream, this Serenity gingerbread model is certain to impress the fans of the cult-favorite Firefly. If you want to make your own, there are plenty of how to pictures on the FaceBook page of its creator, Kristoffer Gressli.

Teracotta Army

History buffs need not be too jealous of sci fi fans. While you may not have as many gingerbread options, you can always content yourself with your own gingerbread version of China’s famous Terracotta army. These lovely little warriors were created by The Pastry Case bakery as part of the 2007 Nantwich Food and Drink Festival.

Ninjabread Men

In the long-standing war between pirates and ninjas, the sneaky assassins have one distinct advantage: they also come in butt-kicking gingerbread form. Sure you could probably style some regular gingerbread men to look like pirates, but they just aren’t going to be as cool as these ones that were specifically designed with ninja moves in mind. Alternatively, you can always get one of these great gingerbread zombies from the Neatoshop knowing they’ll never go bad.

Of course, if all of these gingerbread delights aren’t enough to satiate you, then feel free to go back and enjoy Stacy’s look at gingerbread masterpieces from 2008. As for you guys, have any of you ever made a geeky gingerbread creation or are you planning to try one out this year? If so, what was your gingerbread design?

In The Lord of the Rings, the Nazgûl were among the most dangerous foes our heroes encountered. Jason Ku, a mechanical engineering student at MIT, rendered a frighteningly realistic one in paper. He’s been active in the craft since the age of five and has clearly mastered it.

Link -via My Modern Met

At least, not without a lot of nail painting skills. Apparently her other hand features the armies of Gondor, but since they didn’t come out well with her camera, she left out those pictures.

Link Via Geeks Are Sexy

Once upon a time, fairy tales were dark fables designed to scare children into good behavior. This is the story of one American author who thought kids deserved better.

In December 1900, L. Frank Baum was a struggling, 44-year-old writer living in Chicago with his wife and four children. Christmas was only days away, and Baum was desperately searching for a way to buy presents for his family.

On a whim, Baum went downtown to ask his publisher for a royalties’ advance for the five books he’d written that year. He walked out with a check for one of the books, and promptly stuck it in his pocket. He didn’t bother to take a look at it.

When Baum arrived home, his wife, Maud, was ironing a shirt. He reluctantly handed her the check, and at the same moment, they both discovered that it was for $1,423.98—roughly $40,000 today. Paralyzed with disbelief, Maud burned a hole through the shirt.

That book, of course, was The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN

Lyman Frank Baum was born in 1856 in Chittenango, New York. As a child, his weak heart limited his capacity for rough-and-tumble play. So, despite being the seventh of nine kids, he spent most of his childhood alone, indoors, and dreaming.

As a young man, Baum leapt like a flea from career to career. By his early 30s, he’d been a journalist, a printer, a postage-stamp dealer, and a champion poultry breeder, which led him into publishing, with his trade journal The Poultry Record. He also ran his own theater company, where he wrote, directed, and acted in his own plays.

Then, in 1881, Baum met his leading lady—Maud Gage, a sophomore at Cornell. But Maud’s mother, Matilda, disapproved of the union. Matilda Gage was a feminist who marched alongside Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony in the women’s suffrage movement. She saw Baum as a flake who’d never amount to anything, and she told her daughter she’d be a “darned fool” to marry the itinerant actor. Yet, Baum’s charm, sincerity, and uncanny ability to tell fantastic stories were no match for Matilda, and he soon won her over. He also became a feminist.

Frank married Maud in 1882, but troubles were around the corner. Baum’s theater company went belly-up, and without local prospects, he looked west for opportunity. In 1888, he moved his family to the Dakota Territory, where he opened a store in the town of Aberdeen. (Years later, when Baum wrote descriptions of the Kansas prairie in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, he was actually describing South Dakota.) His shop, Baum’s Bazaar, sold Chinese paper lanterns, Bohemian glass, gourmet chocolates, and other exotic items. But Baum overestimated the frontier’s demands for novelty shopping. In a few short years, he’d gone bust yet again.

At this point, L. Frank Baum was 35 with no career. He headed east for Chicago, where he received guidance from an unexpected source: his mother-in-law. Matilda Gage convinced Baum to pursue his one true talent, telling stories. In Aberdeen, children had stalked Baum, demanding story hour from the raconteur. Kids loved his tales because they weren’t thinly disguised morality lessons. Instead, Baum’s stories were fantasies filled with candy, toys, magic, and adventure. Heeding Matilda’s advice, Baum decided to give writing a try.

FOLLOWING THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD

In 1899, Baum teamed up with illustrator W.W. Denslow and published Father Goose, His Book, a collection of pictures and verse. The collaboration worked so well that it inspired Baum and Denslow to try their hands at a full-length novel.

As a child, Baum had loved the European fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, but he loathed the dark, grisly endings. He envisioned a new American fairy tale in which ingenuity and spunk paid off. In Baum’s words, he wanted to create a world where “wonderment and joy are retained, and the heartache and nightmares left out.”

It was a great idea, but what would he call this utopia? Family legend holds that Baum scanned his office for ideas. While staring at his filing cabinet, he drew inspiration from a label on the bottom drawer marked “O-Z.”

Baum’s book was turned down by every major publishing house. Finally, a distribution company agreed to take on the novel about Oz, but only if Baum and Denslow agreed to shoulder the printing expenses. The bet paid off. Today, the masterful integration of color illustrations and text is heralded as a pioneering achievement in literature, a precursor to the graphic novel. Denslow’s drawings were unique in that they not only reflected the plot, but also furthered it. His vibrant pictures spilled over from one page to the next.

More importantly, children loved Baum’s story. By the end of 1900, Maude had burned a hole through her husband’s shirt, and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was the best-selling book in America.

OZ FEST

Over the next 20 years, Baum would pen more than 70 books under several pseudonyms. Unfettered by gender restrictions, he often wrote under female names, including Suzanne Metcalf, Laura Bancroft, and Edith Van Dyne. Baum also tried his hand at science-fiction, demonstrating a knack for predicting the future on par with H.G. Wells. A running theme in Baum’s work was the triumph of technology over distance and time, and many of his fictional inventions—televisions, satellites, cell phones, laptops—eventually became realities of everyday life.

In 1902, Oz was transformed into a Broadway musical, shortened simply to The Wizard of Oz.
At first, Baum was taken aback by some of the changes. For instance, Dorothy’s faithful companion on the stage wasn’t Toto, but a cow named Imogene.

But when the play became a Broadway hit, Baum softened. He tried to return to the theater to produce his own plays, but all his efforts, including The Whatnexters and The King of Gee Whiz, were flops. He also tried his hand at a vaudeville show, “Fairylogues and Radio Plays,” but that foundered, too.

The truth was that Baum wanted to stop writing about Dorothy and do something new. He intended for the sixth Oz book, The Emerald City of Oz, to be the last in the series. In the story, Baum seals off his fairyland, proclaiming it unreachable from the outside world. But when a film project he was pursuing collapsed, Baum quickly found himself strapped for funds again. He wrote another Oz book, and from then on, Dorothy and the gang kept resurfacing every time Baum needed to pad his wallet.

IT’S A TWISTER

In 1919, Baum died of the same heart condition that had kept him indoors as a child. But even death couldn’t stop the Oz stories from flowing. Baum wrote the 14th book in the series, Glinda of Oz, on his deathbed, and it was published posthumously. After that, various authors churned out 26 official sequels, which have been translated into 22 languages, from Tamil to Serbo-Croatian.

In 1939, the Oz legacy hit a turning point when MGM released The Wizard of Oz movie. Based on Baum’s original storyline, the plot and characters remained relatively faithful to the book, although there were plenty of changes, too. Most of the quotables (“And your little dog, too!”) were Hollywood additions, as were the musical numbers and dancing little people. There were some changes to the story, as well. Dorothy’s slippers, which were silver in the book, were changed to ruby in the movie to show off the new technology of color film.

The key difference between the two versions is that in the movie, Dorothy’s adventure was “all a dream,” while in Baum’s book, Oz was very much real. In fact, later in the book series, Uncle Henry and Auntie Em move to the Emerald City to dine off jeweled plates and converse with talking animals. As it turned out, nobody really wanted to go home to Kansas.

(Image from the NeatoShop)

The movie established Dorothy, the Tin Man, the Scarecrow, and the Cowardly Lion as cultural icons. Flying monkeys and yellow brick roads became part of the national psyche, and today, Oz’s popularity shows no sign of waning. The movies, the spin-offs, the Broadway musicals, the plays, and—more recently—the pop-up book just keep cropping up. Much like Dorothy and the gang, Baum took the long way to finding his true calling, but there’s no denying that he left behind an enduring legacy. By writing the quintessential American fairy tale, Baum proved that even late bloomers living in their own fantasy world are entitled to happy endings.

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The article by Kelly K. Ferguson is reprinted from the May- June 2010 issue of mental_floss magazine.

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